The present invention relates to exterior vehicle mirrors which include a supplemental turn signal, and more particularly to the use of a flexible circuit board allowing the turn signal display sections to conform to the surface of various exterior side mirrors and to reduce weight.
Current motor vehicles include turn signals at the front and rear of the vehicle to alert other drivers when the vehicle is turning or making a lane change. It is advantageous to make the turn signals as conspicuous as possible to an adjacent vehicle. However, styling considerations have generally dictated against the use of additional lights on the body of the vehicles.
It is known to project turn signals from the exterior mirrors of a vehicle to provide a prominent turn signal indication in addition to the mandated signal. One commercial exterior side mirror includes a turn signal indicator displayed in the mirror glass. The known mirror apparatus utilizes a mirror glass which is reflective of most visible light wavelengths but substantially transparent to a small predetermined band of light wavelengths. A turn signal indicator is displayed by an LED array behind the mirror glass generating light of the small predetermined wavelength. However, the method for manufacturing the mirror glass which transmits only the predetermined wavelength is expensive. In addition, the light sources required to generate light of the predetermined wavelength are more expensive than a light source which generates a wider spectrum of light wavelengths.